Purpose of Freedom of Information (FOI)

The purpose of the Freedom of Information Act 1982 , (“the FOI Act”) is to give members of the public rights of access to information held by the Government of the Commonwealth and of its agencies. Under the FOI Act, members of the public can seek access to documents held by the Department of Health (the Department).

Making a Freedom of Information (FOI) request

Requests to access documents from the Department must:

be made in writing;

state that the request is an application for the purposes of the FOI Act;

provide enough information to clearly identify the documents sought.

To make an FOI request, download and complete the request for access to documents under Freedom of Information Act 1982 (Cth)

Charges

There is no fee for making an FOI request. The FOI Act provides that charges may be imposed for processing requests (except where you are seeking documents containing your own personal information). Should your FOI request incur any charges, you will be provided with an estimate of the applicable charges. Your request will not proceed until a response to the estimate is received by the Department.

Health may decide to remit, reduce or not impose processing charges under certain circumstances.

Freedom of Information Disclosure Logs

The Department of Health is required by s 11C of the FOI Act to disclose access decisions through a disclosure log on its website. The disclosure log provides access to information which has been released in response to an FOI request.

The disclosure log requirement does not apply to:

personal information about any person if publication of that information would be ‘unreasonable’

information about the business, commercial, financial or professional affairs of any person if publication of that information would be ‘unreasonable’

other information covered by a determination made by the Australian Information Commissioner if publication of that information would be ‘unreasonable’

any information if it is not reasonably practicable to publish the information because of the extent of modifications that would need to be made to delete the information listed in the above dot points.

The information that is described in this disclosure log is information that has been released by Health under the FOI Act 1982 and is available for public access.

Information Publication Scheme (IPS)

The IPS requires agencies to publish a broad range of information on their websites, and to make it available for downloading where possible. The IPS enhances the amount of government information that is available to the public and underpins a pro-disclosure culture across government. As part of this, agencies are also required to publish an Agency Plan to explain how they intend to implement the IPS.

Contacts and further information

If you would like further information about making a Freedom of Information request, please contact the FOI Unit on +61 2 6289 1666 or by email:foi@health.gov.au

The Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) website provides useful information about the FOI process, publications and resources.